Sour Cherry Saison

I've recently been getting more interested in saisons – farmhouse ales traditionally brewed in Belgium in the fall or winter for farm workers to drink during the following harvest. These beers were comparatively low in alcohol and were made from local ingredients, making them unique and complex while also being refreshing and thirst quenching.

Now that my hop plants are finally growing and producing tons of cones, it seemed like it would be fun to make my own variation on a saison using a variety of local ingredients. I ran across several sour cherry trees with fruit that was ready to be picked, and it seemed like these could fit the style well by adding a light sourness and an interesting flavor.

Unfortunately, I'm not entirely sure what types of hops I've now grown and harvested (though I suspect they're Cascades), as I planted several different types of hops around the same time and only one plant survived. Nonetheless, they look and smell good, so I decided to add them to the saison for aroma and flavor, relying on a store-bought hop with known alpha acid levels for bitterness. To help get a rough estimate the level of flavor and/or bitterness that my hops would provide compared to store-bought hops, I dried them out for a day or two before adding them.

After picking and pitting loads of sour cherries, I froze them for a couple of weeks to help break down the cell walls (this makes it easier for them to add flavor to the beer without being cut up or juiced). On brew day, I let them thaw in a large bowl, and added them slowly towards the end of the boil to preserve their flavor without not lowering the temperature of the wort too much.

The recipe itself is pretty straightforward - pilsner, vienna and wheat malts for flavor, plus some corn sugar to help dry out the beer (this is important for a partial mash recipe since it helps to increase the relative amount of fermentable sugars in the wort, ensuring that the final beer will be dry enough). Since saison yeast tends to do fine at higher temperatures, I didn't worry about trying to regulate the fermentation temperature too much.

Sour Cherry Saison

(Partial Mash)

Batch Size: 5 Gal

Anticipated OG: 1.062 (not including cherries)
Anticipated Alcohol: 6.4% (not including cherries)

Anticipated SRM: 4.8 (not including cherries)

Anticipated IBU: 45

Brewhouse Efficiency: 60%

Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Fermentables:

5 lbs Light malt extract syrup

2 lbs Pilsner

2 lbs Vienna

1 lb Wheat

1 lb Corn sugar

Hops:

1 oz Palisades (6.7 AA) - 60 min

1.5 oz Homegrown Hops - 15 min

1.5 oz Homegrown Hops - 3 min

1.1 oz Homegrown Hops - 0 min (dry hopped)

Extras:

5 lbs of pitted fresh sour cherries (frozen)

Yeast:

Wyeast 3724 Belgian Saison

Mini Mash Schedule:

60 min @ 150˚ F

Notes:

Brewed 8/22/10

Transferred to a secondary 8/29/10, added dry hops

Bottled ~1 month later


See tasting notes for this beer.